Rose by any other name
by Tracy Diane Miller
Summary: This very short story was inspired by "Rose."


Rose By Any Other Name  
  
Summary: This very short story was inspired by "Rose".  
  
Disclaimer: Early Edition characters belong to whoever created them. No copyright infringement intended. No profit is being made. Some of the dialogue that appears in this story is not my own, but belongs to the writer of the Early Edition episode "Rose."  
  
Author's Notes: It has always amazed me how television and movies seem to love to portray twins as a "good versus evil battle." Maybe this is done for dramatic tension, i.e. more interesting to assume that there is this hatred of a person who is one's genetic match and that a rivalry exists. Well, I submit to you that I feel blessed that I am a twin. It was, of course, something I had no control over but it represents the very best thing that has ever happened to me because I got a sister, a best friend, and a champion all rolled into one person :). Stacy, you're aces in my book :)!  
  
In this fan fic, however, I took a more troubling look at what should be a wonderfully unique and special relationship by examining it through Rose's eyes.  
  
Author: Tracy Diane Miller E-mail address: tdmiller82@hotmail.com  
  
Rose By Any Other Name  
  
A rose by any other name was supposed to smell so sweet. It was supposed to be a beautiful wonderment with petals that are soft and innocent. But this "Rose" was full of thorns. Try as she might to hide them under a helpless facade, she was a piranha, dangerous and deadly. And she had him just where she wanted him.  
  
She watched as he placed the bag of money, $25,000, on the floor by the door. He turned around. Without warning, she grabbed him and kissed him hard on the mouth. The kiss was hot and sensual. It was aggressive and self-assured. And it was a kiss so uncharacteristic of the quiet, almost virginal demeanor exhibited by the lost woman who had fallen asleep on his bed last night and who had showed up downstairs in the office this morning shyly wearing one of his shirts. She seemed different somehow.  
  
She sensed his discomfort. "What?" She asked.  
  
"Nothing. I...ah..." He stammered.  
  
"It's just my way of thanking you." She explained.  
  
"Oh, well...I...ah."  
  
"You don't like it when I thank you?" She questioned.  
  
"No, I.."  
  
"You're not going to leave that there, are you?" She asked, gesturing at the bag of money.  
  
"It's safe." He reassured.  
  
She panicked when he informed her that he wanted to call someone named Crumb so they could go and deliver the money to Jess. She couldn't let him do that. That would ruin everything. She pretended to be concerned for his welfare when all the while a plan brewed in her head. She knew that she had him just where she wanted him. She told him that she needed to take a shower. With manufactured vulnerability, she rained one last kiss upon his lips, gentler this time, before retreating into the bathroom.  
  
She heard the front door close.  
  
Finally alone, she stripped out of those clothes and out of that ingenue persona. She stepped into the shower and turned on the full force of the water. The blast was merciless, the intensity of the spraying water was as untamed and undisciplined as herself.  
  
Only a momentary twinge of guilt seized her, but that feeling quickly passed. This money would give her the kind of life she had always wanted, the kind of life that she deserved. He was so stupid. Who gives a stranger $25,000 of his own money? But even in his stupidity, with those smoldering eyes yet shy, boyish exterior, he had excited her. As the water doused her body, she fantasized briefly about corrupting his morals and teaching him how to walk on the wild side. She would begin by taking him to bed. Their passion would be void of any love or commitment, which was the way it had always been for her. Sex had never been about love; it had always been a game to her something to weaken men and to make them more malleable to her feminine wiles. Use men before they used her. That was her mantra.  
  
But if she stuck around long enough for the ecstasy of a sexual encounter with that foolish Boy Scout that would jeopardize a plan for which she had been a careful architect. She needed to just disappear perhaps go to some tropical paradise where she could spend her days lounging around on a flawless beach sipping one of those sinful drinks with the little umbrellas and her nights doing whatever suited her fancy. And she would be Rose, all Rose, with no carbon copy interloper who shared her face. She would be free of Lily once and for all.  
  
Lily.  
  
How many years had she had to endure being compared to the measly paragon of virtue? Her identical twin. When they were little and dressed alike, people on the street would stop them with a "look at the twins" comment. And the stares were the worse. She felt as if she were some kind of circus freak expected to perform for a curious crowd's entertainment pleasure. Over the years her mounting frustrations over being forced to mortgage her individuality because of some genetic predetermination turned into anger. It was never just about her, Rose. It was always about Rose and Lily as if they were conjoined twins, the Chang and Eng of modern society. People looked at them and saw only one person. She felt stifled under the burden of being a twin. And she always felt condemned for being a free spirit. Lily followed the rules like some mindless robot, but she believed that rules were meant to be broken. She refused to look back on her life with regret for those things she hadn't done because of an adherence to someone else's rules. Consequently, her behavior branded her the "bad girl." She heard from everyone (parents, teachers, and neighbors) that something was wrong with her.  
  
"Why can't you be more like Lily?" They questioned.  
  
She turned off the shower. A few moments later, she was dressed. She proceeded to the closet and removed the bag of money. She glanced one last time at the room before leaving to begin her new life.  
  
She was a woman consumed by bitterness and anger. Instead of embracing her sister's love, she had tossed it aside.  
  
What she didn't understand was that a "rose" blooms through nurturing. It is nature that provides the nurturing. A person "blooms" through the nurture of her family. Rose had thrown such nurturing away in the name of greed and anger.  
  
Two flowers, a rose and a lily, both need nurturing to bloom and to be enjoyed. They can't do it alone. No one is able to bloom or grow alone.  
  
The End. 


End file.
